Heavy minerals solve structural and stratigraphic problems in Ordovician strata of the western Irish Caledonides

Abstract

Heavy minerals in Ordovician successions in western Ireland record, in the Upper Arenig Sheeffry Formation, the erosion of an ophiolite/island arc complex. The appearance of staurolite and garnet at a basin-wide horizon in the Lower Llanvirn Upper Derrylea Formation signals the unroofing of the Dalradian metamorphic complex. Parts of the Ordovician sequence on Inishturk and in two small inliers are correlated with the standard sequence with unexpected results. The garnet-, sillimanite-, and staurolite-bearing Letter Formation correlates with the Upper Derrylea Formation and, on Inishturk, heavy minerals in south-younging turbidites reveal a sinistral ramp zone, that places the Sheeffry Formation structurally above and to the south of the younger Derrylea Formation.